History Main / AlternativeCalendar

* The nations of Euterpe in Teresa Edgerton's ''Goblin Moon'' use a calendar of nine forty-day "seasons", rather than months. The actual solar year is a bit longer than that, so celebratory "intercalary days" round it out every three seasons.

** Another Asimov story involves people from "our world" encountering people from a German-speaking parallel Earth which counts their calendar ''nach Hitler'' - "after Hitler". Presumably their calendar begins in 1889 (Hitler's birth year), 1933 (when Hitler came to power in Germany) or the year Hitler died in that reality. The story takes place far enough in the future that the protagonists don't evince the horror that we might at the prospect of a world where the Nazis won.*** The year turns out to be "Zwei tausend drei hundert vier-und-sechzig nach Hitler" (i.e. 2364 NH). Apparently that's long enough that their culture is no longer Nazi-like; they readily abandon their claim to an uninhabited third Earth simply because the protagonists' world got there first. The introduction of the Nazi-descended world may be simply a pun of sorts on the story title: "Living Space" ("Lebensraum" in German).

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** Another Asimov story involves people from "our world" encountering people from a German-speaking parallel Earth which counts their calendar ''nach Hitler'' - -- "after Hitler". Presumably their calendar begins in 1889 (Hitler's birth year), 1933 (when Hitler came to power in Germany) or the year Hitler died in that reality. The story takes place far enough in the future that the protagonists don't evince the horror that we might at the prospect of a world where the Nazis won.*** The year turns out to be "Zwei tausend drei hundert vier-und-sechzig nach Hitler" (i.e. 2364 NH). Apparently NH) -- apparently that's long enough that their culture is no longer Nazi-like; they readily abandon their claim to an uninhabited third Earth simply because the protagonists' world got there first. The introduction of the Nazi-descended world may be simply a pun of sorts on the story title: "Living Space" ("Lebensraum" in German).

* In Creator/EdgarRiceBurroughs's ''Literature/{{Pellucidar}}'', the immobility of the central sun prevents any sort of celestial timekeeping, leading the protagonists to proclaim (unconvincingly) that there is "no such thing as time" at the Earth's core.** Evidently, the possibility of estimating time's passage by means of tides, heartbeats, sleeping habits, when the hero needs a shave, or any other ground-based phenomena never occurred to Burroughs.*** Burroughs claimed that time in Pellucidar ''passes more swiftly for you when you're exerting yourself more''. At one point, the hero and his friend were separated and the hero had several weeks worth of adventures: fighting, running, lots of hard work. His friend merely strolled back to their lodgings, so only about an hour passed for him. It's a pity the "I'm not making this up" category has been disabled, because this nonsense ''deserves'' it.

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* In Creator/EdgarRiceBurroughs's ''Literature/{{Pellucidar}}'', the immobility of the central sun prevents any sort of celestial timekeeping, leading the protagonists to proclaim (unconvincingly) that there is "no such thing as time" at the Earth's core.** Evidently, the possibility of estimating time's passage by means of tides, heartbeats, sleeping habits, when the hero needs a shave, or any other ground-based phenomena never occurred to Burroughs.*** Burroughs claimed that core. In fact, time in Pellucidar ''passes more swiftly for you when you're exerting yourself more''. At one point, the hero and his friend were separated and the hero had several weeks worth of adventures: fighting, running, lots of hard work. His friend merely strolled back to their lodgings, so only about an hour passed for him. It's a pity the "I'm not making this up" category has been disabled, because this nonsense ''deserves'' it.

* In ''Literature/StarTrekDepartmentOfTemporalInvestigations'', alongside multiple human calendars including Christian, Islamic, Hindu and Mayan examples, the chapter headings include dating systems from many Star Trek cultures, including Vulcan, Andorian, Cardassian, Klingon, Deltan, Tandaran and Risian. Most of these alien calendars have been plotted out in full by the author in his annotations. Other Franchise/StarTrekNovelVerse books have given dates in mostly consistant Klingon, Vulcan, Romulan and Andorian calendars, but this is probably the first time the entire calendar has been plotted for so many races.

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* In ''Literature/StarTrekDepartmentOfTemporalInvestigations'', alongside multiple human calendars including Christian, Islamic, Hindu and Mayan examples, the chapter headings include dating systems from many Star Trek cultures, including Vulcan, Andorian, Cardassian, Klingon, Deltan, Tandaran and Risian. Most of these alien calendars have been plotted out in full by the author in his annotations. Other Franchise/StarTrekNovelVerse books have given dates in mostly consistant consistent Klingon, Vulcan, Romulan and Andorian calendars, but this is probably the first time the entire calendar has been plotted for so many races.

* Played in the MMORPG ''VideoGame/EveOnline''. One of the EVE chronicles discusses how the four empires decided on a common calendar system. They ended up using the Gregorian calendar, and they date of the decision became January 1, year 0. The months of the EVE calendar match up with those in real life. Years are done a little differently; the year of the game's launch, 2003, corresponds with the in-game year 105. 2008 is referred to in-game as year 110.

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* Played in In the MMORPG ''VideoGame/EveOnline''. One ''VideoGame/EveOnline'', one of the EVE chronicles discusses how the four empires decided on a common calendar system. They ended up using the Gregorian calendar, and they the date of the decision became January 1, year 0. The months of the EVE calendar match up with those in real life. Years are done a little differently; the year of the game's launch, 2003, corresponds with the in-game year 105. 2008 is referred to in-game as year 110.

* ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'' uses moons as a measurement of time, though it's never specified exactly how long this is. Common {{Fanon}} is that, much like other fantasy examples, one moon is equivalent to one month. Granny Smith mentions that it had been "over one hundred moons" since the last Apple family reunion, meaning about eight years had passed since the last one under this theory.

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* ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'' uses moons as a measurement of time, though it's never specified exactly how long this is. Common {{Fanon}} is that, much like other fantasy examples, one moon is equivalent to one month. Granny Smith mentions that it had been "over one hundred moons" since the last Apple family reunion, meaning about eight years had passed since the last one under this theory.theory (assuming the same number of moons as in an Earth year).

** And not only that, but also the days themselves were decimally divided in ten hours, each new hour into 100 minutes, each new minute into 1000 seconds, and each new second into 1000 tierces (Latin for "third"). This system was hardly ever used even by the government and quickly fell into obscurity.** The French Republican Calendar was revived in 1870 by the Commune of Paris. It was abolished when the Communards were crushed.

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** And not only that, but also the days themselves were decimally divided in ten hours, each new hour into 100 minutes, and each new minute into 1000 seconds, and each new second into 1000 tierces (Latin for "third").100 seconds. This system was hardly ever used even by the government and quickly fell into obscurity.** The French Republican Calendar was revived in 1870 by the Commune of Paris. It was abolished when the Communards were crushed.crushed about two weeks later.

** Judaism follows a ''lunisolar'' calendar (one that is both solar and lunar), built around the New Moon as the start of the month, and counts years from the Biblical date of the creation of the universe[[labelnote:*]]Before anyone gets the wrong idea, the vast majority of Jews--even the Orthodox--do accept that the Earth is not 6,000 years old, but also see no need to change their epoch date. Besides, even if they wanted to, [[JewsLoveToArgue you couldn't get everyone to agree on a new epoch date]], so might as well not broach the subject.[[/labelnote]] (2008 corresponds to 5768/9 -- the New Year is in September or thereabouts - aiming for Autumnal Equinox). The calendar uses a 19-year Metonic cycle, adding leap months in a set sequence of years, in order to keep all holidays falling in the same seasons. The calendar was originally invented by Greek astronomer Meton in 3rd crntury BCE.*** The Buddhists use similar calendar. Incidentally, they both use same dates.

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** Judaism follows a ''lunisolar'' calendar (one that is both solar and lunar), built around the New Moon as the start of the month, and counts years from the Biblical date of the creation of the universe[[labelnote:*]]Before anyone gets the wrong idea, the vast majority of modern Jews--even the Orthodox--do accept that the Earth is not 6,000 years old, but also see no need to change their epoch date. Besides, even if they wanted to, [[JewsLoveToArgue you couldn't get everyone to agree on a new epoch date]], so might as well not broach the subject.[[/labelnote]] (2008 corresponds to 5768/9 -- the New Year is in September or thereabouts - aiming for Autumnal Equinox). The calendar uses a 19-year Metonic cycle, adding leap months in a set sequence of years, in order to keep all holidays falling in the same seasons. The calendar was originally invented by Greek astronomer Meton in the 3rd crntury century BCE.*** The Buddhists use a similar calendar. Incidentally, they both use the same dates.

* ThoseWackyNazis tried to replace the Latin-derived months' names by more "Aryan" ones. This was the brain-child of [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georg_Ritter_von_Sch%C3%B6nerer Georg von Schönerer]] (a late 19th-century anti-semitic and far-right radical from Austria), and is from long before the Nazis' time.

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* ThoseWackyNazis tried to replace the Latin-derived months' names by more "Aryan" ones. This was the brain-child of [[http://en.[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georg_Ritter_von_Sch%C3%B6nerer Georg von Schönerer]] (a late 19th-century anti-semitic antisemitic and far-right radical from Austria), and is from long before the Nazis' time.

*** The custom is common among Semitic languages; the Arabic days of the week (Al-Ahad, al-Ithnayn, al-Thulatha'...) mostly translate to "First, Second, Third...," but Friday is "al-Jumu`ah," or "Gathering" (because it's the day of praying together in the mosque) and Saturday is "al-Sabt". ''Al-Sabt'' comes from the same common the same root as "Shabbat," which appears to be influenced by (but not directly derived from) the common Semitic root S-B-` (realized in Arabic as ''saba`ah'' and in Hebrew as ''shev`a''), as both Hebrew and Arabic reckon Sunday as the "first day" of the week. ''Al-Sabt'' is mentioned in Literature/TheQuran as the day on which God rested after creating the world (as in TheBookOfGenesis), and the Muslim Sabbath was on Saturday (and Muslims prayed toward Jerusalem) until the Jews of Medina pissed Muhammad and the Muslim community off. At that point, they changed the direction of prayer to Makkah (an almost literal about-face--Medina is about halfway between the two) and changed the Sabbath to Friday (honoring the last day of creation, on which He created Man), which became ''al-Jumu`ah'' to reflect this change (to pagan Arabs, Friday was ''al-Suds'', "Sixth Day", while Saturday was always ''al-Sabt'', reflecting common Semitic tradition). Interestingly, this allows the days of the week to line up with the workweek in some countries; some Arabic-speaking countries (e.g. Egypt) have Friday-Saturday weekends, meaning that the workweek starts on "First Day."

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*** The custom is common among Semitic languages; the Arabic days of the week (Al-Ahad, al-Ithnayn, al-Thulatha'...) mostly translate to "First, Second, Third...," but Friday is "al-Jumu`ah," or "Gathering" (because it's the day of praying together in the mosque) and Saturday is "al-Sabt". ''Al-Sabt'' comes from the same common the same root as "Shabbat," which appears to be influenced by (but not directly derived from) the common Semitic root S-B-` (realized in Arabic as ''saba`ah'' and in Hebrew as ''shev`a''), as both Hebrew and Arabic reckon Sunday as the "first day" of the week. ''Al-Sabt'' is mentioned in Literature/TheQuran as the day on which God rested after creating the world (as in TheBookOfGenesis), and the Muslim Sabbath was on Saturday (and Muslims prayed toward Jerusalem) until the Jews of Medina pissed Muhammad and the Muslim community off. At that point, they changed the direction of prayer to Makkah Mecca (an almost literal about-face--Medina is about halfway between the two) and changed the Sabbath to Friday (honoring the last day of creation, on which He created Man), which became ''al-Jumu`ah'' to reflect this change (to pagan Arabs, Friday was ''al-Suds'', "Sixth Day", while Saturday was always ''al-Sabt'', reflecting common Semitic tradition). Interestingly, this allows the days of the week to line up with the workweek in some countries; some Arabic-speaking countries (e.g. Egypt) have Friday-Saturday weekends, meaning that the workweek starts on "First Day."

* [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renaming_of_Turkmen_months_and_days_of_week,_2002 Turkmenistan's rubber-stamp government decided to rename their entire calendar, INCLUDING the days of the week, in 2002.]] This was a basic decree by their somewhat insane leader, Saparmurat Niyazov, aka the Turkmenbashi and [[CloudCuckooLander one-time administrative assistant to the Mayor of Cloudcuckooland]]. Since his death, such decrees have been removed from the book of law.

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* [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renaming_of_Turkmen_months_and_days_of_week,_2002 Turkmenistan's rubber-stamp government decided to rename their entire calendar, INCLUDING the days of the week, in 2002.]] This was a basic decree by their somewhat insane leader, Saparmurat Niyazov, aka the Turkmenbashi and [[CloudCuckooLander one-time administrative assistant to the Mayor of Cloudcuckooland]]. Since his death, such decrees have been removed from the book of law.legal code.

* In AncientGreece, every polis had its own calendar, with years named after government officials (like ephors in Sparta or archons in Athens). These calendars were very often very quirky (for instance, Athens had a calendar of ''ten'' months, which had some interesting connections to the Athenian constitution).[[note]]If you must insist, the citizens of Athens were divided into ten tribes. Every year, 50 male members of each tribe were selected--by lot!--to sit on the "Council of 500", aka the ''Boule''. The ''Boule'' set the agenda of the ''Ekklesia'', or Popular Assembly (the assembly of all free male citizens of Athens, which had final authority on everything), and certain other responsibilities as well. Of these, the most important of was that of sitting vigil. Each of the ten Athenian tribes was assigned a month. During that month, its 50 members of the ''Boule'' were expected to remain at the ''Boule''[='s=] building day and night in order to respond quickly to any crisis that might arise. Convenient, isn't it, that there were ten months and ten tribes?[[/note]] Oh, and that was just ''one'' of Athens' calendars; the ten-month solar Athenian political calendar, used for scheduling state business, ran in parallel to the twelve-month lunisolar Athenian festival calendar, used for religious and agricultural purposes. And we repeat, ''each'' state had at least one calendar of its own, and some also had more; keeping track must have been a headache with over a thousand different states in place. The historians sometimes used the Olympic games for counting the years, but no one else did.* Javanese people in Indonesia uses month names taken from Islamic calendar. The month names are Sura (Muharram), Sapar (Safar), Mulud (Rabi al-awwal), Bakda Mulud (Rabi al-thani), Jumadil Awal (Jumada al-awwal), Jumadil Akhir (Jumada al-thani), Rejeb (Rajab), Ruwah (Sha'aban), Pasa (Ramadhan), Sawal (Shawwal), Sela (Dhul al-Qi'dah) and Besar (Dhul al-Hijjah).

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* In AncientGreece, every polis had its own calendar, with years named after government officials (like ephors in Sparta or archons in Athens). These calendars were very often very quirky (for instance, Athens had a calendar of ''ten'' months, which had some interesting connections to the Athenian constitution).[[note]]If you must insist, the citizens of Athens were divided into ten tribes. Every year, 50 male members of each tribe were selected--by lot!--to sit on the "Council of 500", aka the ''Boule''. The ''Boule'' set the agenda of the ''Ekklesia'', or Popular Assembly (the assembly of all free male citizens of Athens, which had final authority on everything), and certain other responsibilities as well. Of these, the most important of was that of sitting vigil. Each of the ten Athenian tribes was assigned a month. During that month, its 50 members of the ''Boule'' were expected to remain at the ''Boule''[='s=] building day and night in order to respond quickly to any crisis that might arise. Convenient, isn't it, that there were ten months and ten tribes?[[/note]] Oh, and that was just ''one'' of Athens' calendars; the ten-month solar Athenian political calendar, used for scheduling state business, ran in parallel to the twelve-month lunisolar Athenian festival calendar, used for religious and agricultural purposes. And we repeat, ''each'' state had at least one calendar of its own, and some also had more; keeping track must have been a headache with over a thousand different states in place. The historians sometimes used the Olympic games for counting the years, but no one else did.* Javanese people in Indonesia uses use month names taken from the Islamic calendar. The month names are Sura (Muharram), Sapar (Safar), Mulud (Rabi al-awwal), Bakda Mulud (Rabi al-thani), Jumadil Awal (Jumada al-awwal), Jumadil Akhir (Jumada al-thani), Rejeb (Rajab), Ruwah (Sha'aban), Pasa (Ramadhan), Sawal (Shawwal), Sela (Dhul al-Qi'dah) and Besar (Dhul al-Hijjah).

* Academic circles are prone to replacing BC/AD with BCE/CE ("Before Common Era"/"Common Era") to be more secular. Generally speaking a cultural non-starter with the general public, also liable to get certain Christian groups angry. The actual purpose behind the idea isn't really to avoid dating by Jesus[[note]]no academic is dumb enough to pretend that's actually changing, what with the numbers being ''exactly the same''[[/note]], but to not have to imply acceptance of a religion that you don't necessarily follow every single time you write the date: "AD" = "Anno Domini" = "year of Our Lord" (so writing AD is equivalent to saying "Jesus is my lord") and BC = "Before Christ" = "Before the Messiah" (so writing BC is equivalent to saying "Jesus is the Messiah"), and non-Christians occasionally get upset with the idea of needing to say what amounts to a small Christian prayer just to communicate simple concepts.[[note]]Interestingly, in the Arabic language, this problem doesn't exist: AD/CE dates are marked ''mīlādiy'', "of/after the Birth." This causes surprisingly few problems, since (1) "the Birth" doesn't directly say anything about Jesus, and (2) most Muslims don't have a problem with saying Jesus is the Biblical Messiah--he's just not God.[[/note]] Granted, this is more of a social statement regarding (and rejecting) the dominance of religion and religious iconography in general and/or this one in particular in [[LanguageEqualsThought language and thus culture]] than a scientific statement, but a statement nonetheless.

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* Academic circles are prone to replacing BC/AD with BCE/CE ("Before Common Era"/"Common Era") to be more secular. Generally speaking a cultural non-starter with the general public, also liable to get certain Christian groups angry. The actual purpose behind the idea isn't really to avoid dating by Jesus[[note]]no Jesus,[[note]]No academic is dumb enough to pretend that's actually changing, what with the numbers being ''exactly the same''[[/note]], same''.[[/note]] but to not have to imply acceptance of a religion that you don't necessarily follow every single time you write the date: "AD" = "Anno Domini" = "year of Our Lord" (so writing AD is equivalent to saying "Jesus is my lord") and BC = "Before Christ" = "Before the Messiah" (so writing BC is equivalent to saying "Jesus is the Messiah"), and non-Christians occasionally get upset with the idea of needing to say what amounts to a small Christian prayer just to communicate simple concepts.[[note]]Interestingly, in the Arabic language, this problem doesn't exist: AD/CE dates are marked ''mīlādiy'', "of/after the Birth." This causes surprisingly few problems, since (1) "the Birth" doesn't directly say anything about Jesus, and (2) most Muslims don't have a problem with saying Jesus is the Biblical Messiah--he's just not God.[[/note]] Granted, this is more of a social statement regarding (and rejecting) the dominance of religion and religious iconography in general and/or this one in particular in [[LanguageEqualsThought language and thus culture]] than a scientific statement, but a statement nonetheless.

** The reason why academics tend to prefer the "Common Era"-phrasing is because its start is entirely arbitrary, and is only followed due to a cultural custom, as Jesus was certainly not actually born in 0 AD, and even if he was, the concept of zero wasn't known in Europe when the dating was started, so they started counting from 1 AD, automatically putting all dates off by a year.

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** The reason why academics tend to prefer the "Common Era"-phrasing is because its start is entirely arbitrary, and is only followed due to a cultural custom, as Jesus was certainly not actually born in 0 AD, AD,[[note]]Going by Literature/TheBible, it was somewhere between 7 BC and 4 AD.[[/note]] and even if he was, the concept of zero wasn't known in Europe when the dating was started, so they started counting from 1 AD, automatically putting all dates off by a year.

* The French Enlightenment gave us August Comte's [[http://myweb.ecu.edu/mccartyr/pos-cal.html Positivist calendar]], which named every day and month after one of history's great men. The new regime created after the French Revolution adopted the same kind of calendar based on humanistic values and working according to a simple mathematical system.* After her [[UsefulNotes/TheFrenchRevolution Revolution]], France tried a ''metric'' calendar, known as [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Republican_Calendar Republican Calendar]] (''Calendrier républicain''). It consisted of twelve 30 day months, each divided in three ten day weeks, with five or six extra holidays at the end of the year. The years begun on Autumnal equinox (1792 being year I), and were reckoned on Roman numerals. While it was very logical, it wasn't too popular, for various reasons (mostly because ten-day weeks meant weekends were a lot rarer!), and only lasted twelve years--or less, considering that many people never really used it, and that even among those who did, the seven-day week was restored after a mere nine years after the Concordat of 1801 reestablished Sunday as a weekly festival. The names of the months and days of the week were changed, one of which (Thermidor, which lasted from July to August) is still remembered in the name of the dish Lobster Thermidor; otherwise, the French Republican months are mostly remembered from the French Revolutionary events, mostly coups (the most significant things remembered by the Republican Calendar are the Law of 14 Frimaire, centralising power in the hands of [[ReignOfTerror the Committee of Public Safety]]; the Thermidorian Reaction, essentially a coup, bringing an end to the Terror; the Coup of Fructidor; the Coup of Floréal; and the Coup of Brumaire (in which Napoleon first one formal political power). They also had separate a name for each [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_republican_calendar#Days_of_the_year day of the year]], trying to mimic the calendar of saints with something secular -- in this case, plants, animals and tools. Which gave us day names like "pig" (Frimaire 5) or "manure" (Nivose 8) - yes, really, they had this. Now imagine all the teasing in school for kids born on these days...** And not only that, but also the days themselves were decimally divided on ten hours, each new hour into 100 minutes, each new minute into 1000 seconds, and each new second into 1000 tierces (Latin for "third"). This system was hardly ever used even by the government and quickly fell into obscurity.** The French Republican Calendar was revived 1870 by the Commune of Paris. It was abolished when the Communards were crushed.** Some French history re-enactors still use the Republican Calendar, and the calendars are still in print. Currently (AD 2015) we live Year CCXXIII.

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* The French Enlightenment gave us August Comte's [[http://myweb.ecu.edu/mccartyr/pos-cal.html Positivist calendar]], which named every day and month after one of history's great men. The new regime created after the French Revolution adopted the same kind of calendar based on humanistic values and working worked according to a simple mathematical system.system. Comte was born when this calendar was still in force. * After her [[UsefulNotes/TheFrenchRevolution Revolution]], France tried a ''metric'' calendar, known as [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Republican_Calendar Republican Calendar]] (''Calendrier républicain''). It consisted of twelve 30 day months, each divided in three ten day weeks, with five or six extra holidays at the end of the year. The years begun on Autumnal the autumn equinox (1792 being year I), and were reckoned on Roman numerals. While it was very logical, it wasn't too popular, for various reasons (mostly because ten-day weeks meant weekends were a lot rarer!), and only lasted twelve years--or less, considering that many people never really used it, and that even among those who did, the seven-day week was restored after a mere nine years after the Concordat of 1801 reestablished Sunday as a weekly festival. The names of the months and days of the week were changed, one of which (Thermidor, which lasted from July to August) is still remembered in the name of the dish Lobster Thermidor; otherwise, the French Republican months are mostly remembered from the French Revolutionary events, mostly coups (the most significant things remembered by the Republican Calendar are the Law of 14 Frimaire, centralising centralizing power in the hands of [[ReignOfTerror the Committee of Public Safety]]; the Thermidorian Reaction, essentially a coup, bringing an end to the Terror; the Coup of Fructidor; the Coup of Floréal; and the Coup of Brumaire (in which Napoleon first one seized formal political power). They also had a separate a name for each [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_republican_calendar#Days_of_the_year day of the year]], trying to mimic the calendar of saints with something secular -- in this case, plants, animals and tools. Which gave us day names like "pig" (Frimaire 5) or "manure" (Nivose 8) - yes, really, they had this. Now imagine all the teasing in school for kids born on these days...** And not only that, but also the days themselves were decimally divided on in ten hours, each new hour into 100 minutes, each new minute into 1000 seconds, and each new second into 1000 tierces (Latin for "third"). This system was hardly ever used even by the government and quickly fell into obscurity.** The French Republican Calendar was revived in 1870 by the Commune of Paris. It was abolished when the Communards were crushed.** Some French history re-enactors still use the Republican Calendar, and the calendars are still in print. Currently (AD 2015) 2016) we live Year CCXXIII.CCXXIV.

** Which was even more short-lived that the French system, mainly because at the point even ''authorities'' doubted whether that was really necessary. They didn't even change the year numbering or month names or even the names of the days of the week (the "calendar reform" was really more about de-synchronizing the weekend: each worker would get one day in five or one day in six off, but it would be different for different workers). Bear in mind that in Russian, Sunday is ''Voskresen'ye'': "Resurrection."* China used [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ke_%28unit%29 decimal time]], similar as French Republican clock, throughout its history before 1912 revolution. The adoption of the Western calendar is widely considered a step ''backwards'' in China.

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** Which was even more short-lived that the French system, mainly because at the that point even the ''authorities'' doubted whether that was really necessary. They didn't even change the year numbering or month names or even the names of the days of the week (the "calendar reform" was really more about de-synchronizing the weekend: each worker would get one day in five or one day in six off, but it would be different for different workers). Bear in mind that in Russian, Sunday is ''Voskresen'ye'': "Resurrection."* China used [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ke_%28unit%29 decimal time]], similar as to the French Republican clock, throughout its history before the 1912 revolution. The adoption of the Western calendar is widely considered a step ''backwards'' in China.

* Human scholars in the ''GarrettPI'' series use the dwarven dating system, because humans' own calendars tend to change too often as monarchs re-start their kingdoms' year count from their own births or coronations.

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* Human scholars in the ''GarrettPI'' ''Literature/GarrettPI'' series use the dwarven dating system, because humans' own calendars tend to change too often as monarchs re-start their kingdoms' year count from their own births or coronations.

* [[AllThereInTheManual Officially]], the year the Arcade game ''VideoGame/{{Strider}}'' is set (2048 A.D., as seen in the first stage's intro) was [[MeaningfulRename rebranded]] by the title's BigBad as "Meio Year One", signaling the beginning of his rule. This was given a nod in the 2014 reboot, which is set in the year "Meio 0048", implying the game happens roughly half a century after Grandmaster Meio took over the world.

* ''FinalFantasyTactics'' uses a calendar based on the Western Zodiac. This was changed in the English PSX version to the Gregorian calendar, but kept in the PSP version.

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* ''FinalFantasyTactics'' ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyTactics'' uses a calendar based on the Western Zodiac. This was changed in the English PSX version to the Gregorian calendar, but kept in the PSP version.

* ''VideoGame/EverQuestII'' takes place in the year 500 A.K. (After Kerafyrm) starting the new calendar after the famous day when the powerfully insane dragon was woken up by mortals and went on a rampage against his own dragon-kind in the original EverQuest. Things get complicated when you try to compare it to the calender that the first game used: There was none. Each server had it's own in-game date, and always fluctuated during downtimes like patches and such. However, it doesn't stop there. During those 500 years between the two games, the Ogres rose up and built a new empire that tried to take over the world. Their own records of the 2nd Rallosian War are recorded in their own established calendar system. Over on the continent of Kunark, the evil {{Lich}} Venril Sathir built a new Sathirian Empire, using the ancient Sathirian Calendar themselves. None of these established calendars have any overlapping date of reference to pinpoint exactly when they take place on a universal calendar that the player can reference. This was done intentionally by the developers so they would have some leeway to fit in new events that happened during the 500 year period without conflicting with anything.

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* ''VideoGame/EverQuestII'' takes place in the year 500 A.K. (After Kerafyrm) starting the new calendar after the famous day when the powerfully insane dragon was woken up by mortals and went on a rampage against his own dragon-kind in the original EverQuest.''VideoGame/EverQuest''. Things get complicated when you try to compare it to the calender that the first game used: There was none. Each server had it's own in-game date, and always fluctuated during downtimes like patches and such. However, it doesn't stop there. During those 500 years between the two games, the Ogres rose up and built a new empire that tried to take over the world. Their own records of the 2nd Rallosian War are recorded in their own established calendar system. Over on the continent of Kunark, the evil {{Lich}} Venril Sathir built a new Sathirian Empire, using the ancient Sathirian Calendar themselves. None of these established calendars have any overlapping date of reference to pinpoint exactly when they take place on a universal calendar that the player can reference. This was done intentionally by the developers so they would have some leeway to fit in new events that happened during the 500 year period without conflicting with anything.

* ''GuildWars'' has its own set of calendars, one for the Canthan continent, and one that is shared by both the Tyrians and Elonans. The Elonan calendar also has a zero year some two centuries before the Tyrian calendar.

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* ''GuildWars'' ''VideoGame/GuildWars'' has its own set of calendars, one for the Canthan continent, and one that is shared by both the Tyrians and Elonans. The Elonan calendar also has a zero year some two centuries before the Tyrian calendar.

* Played in the MMORPG ''EveOnline''. One of the EVE chronicles discusses how the four empires decided on a common calendar system. They ended up using the Gregorian calendar, and they date of the decision became January 1, year 0. The months of the EVE calendar match up with those in real life. Years are done a little differently; the year of the game's launch, 2003, corresponds with the in-game year 105. 2008 is referred to in-game as year 110.

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* Played in the MMORPG ''EveOnline''.''VideoGame/EveOnline''. One of the EVE chronicles discusses how the four empires decided on a common calendar system. They ended up using the Gregorian calendar, and they date of the decision became January 1, year 0. The months of the EVE calendar match up with those in real life. Years are done a little differently; the year of the game's launch, 2003, corresponds with the in-game year 105. 2008 is referred to in-game as year 110.

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